Auburn's Malzahn now part of Browns' coaching search

Why is a man who was a high school coach as recently as 2005 suddenly near the top of the Browns' head coaching search?

Steve Doerschuk CantonRep.com sports writer @sdoerschukREP

Nick Saban may not be an option, but the Browns' journey to their next head coach seems to be going through him.

Josh McDaniels, a strong candidate to replace Rob Chudzinski, launched his coaching career as a graduate assistant under Saban at Michigan State.

Another interview target, Adam Gase, was a Michigan State student when Saban was head coach there and then began his coaching life with Saban at LSU.

It's a reach to say emerging candidate Gus Malzahn, Auburn's head coach, is in Saban's class. On the other hand, Malzahn had to go through Saban to reach this year's national championship game.

On Nov. 30, Malzahn's team stayed in a shootout with Saban's Alabama juggernaut and won 34-28 on a touchdown return of a missed field goal.

Malzahn, 48, is little known among football fans in the Midwest, but he is regarded in coaching circles as a no-huddle mastermind with a knack for adapting — and scoring.

In Auburn's last seven SEC games, the Tigers averaged 45.1 points. They surged into the national title game by beating Missouri 59-42.

Malzahn's background is reminiscent of Butch Davis, in that both were disappointed college football players at Arkansas, rose in the high school coaching ranks, and spent some of their formative coaching years in Tulsa, Okla.

Davis became Cleveland's head coach with a background on defense. Malzahn stayed in the high school ranks much longer than Davis — he was a varsity head coach in Arkansas as recently as 2005 — and he has been all about offense.

He was Auburn's offensive coordinator in 2010 when the Tigers savaged South Carolina 56-17 in the SEC title game en route to beating Chip Kelly's Oregon team 22-19 in the national championship game.

Malzahn won that year's Broyles Award, emblematic of the nation's top assistant coach.

Eager to prove he could be a college head coach before he got too old, Malzahn took a shot in his home state, at Arkansas State. In 2012, his lone season as pilot, he went 9-3.

Auburn struggled under head coach Gene Chizik the year Malzahn was away, failing to win an SEC game and losing 49-0 to Saban's team. Chizik was fired with years left on his contract. Auburn resolved to pay off $7.5 million to Chizik and hired Malzahn on Dec. 4, 2012.

Malzahn arrived with a reputation for adapting well to whatever players happened to be on board. He showed off his mastery of the passing game on Auburn's 2010 national title game.

In 2013, he doesn't have Cam Newton at quarterback. He migrated to a running game that wound up No. 1 in the nation.

Like most head coaches, Malzahn has relied on players from his past to help him as a coach. His offensive coordinator at Auburn is Ryan Lashlee, who played quarterback for him when Malzahn was head coach at Shiloh Christian High School in Arkansas.

Failing to improve during the season was the top reason Browns CEO Joe Banner cited for firing Chudzinski. The improvement of Malzahn's team after a 35-21 loss at LSU on Sept. 21 was striking.

Part of it had to do with Malzahn shifting emphasis from passing to running after judging that best suited his personnel.

Malzahn has no NFL experience. It's a reach to imagine he could quickly figure out how to end the Browns' long-time failings, say, against arch-rival Pittsburgh.

On the other hand, he did fairly well against Auburn's arch-rival. As offensive coordinator in 2010, he helped the Tigers win 28-27 in Tuscaloosa.

Much more recently, he was celebrating while Nick Saban trudged off the field in disappointment.

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